Motorola yesterday agreed to buy the research and development arm and patent portfolio of mobile phone maker Sendo. No financial details were released. Under the deal, Motorola is acquiring 200 Sendo engineers -- 170 in the company's headquarters of Birmingham, UK, and the rest in Singapore. Motorola said it will integrate the engineers into its Mobile Devices unit. Motorola also gets access to Sendo's design and test equipment and its intellectual property portfolio, including 50 existing and 40 pending patents. The news ends weeks of rumors that Sendo was close to shutting down. Sendo this week entered into the UK's version of bankruptcy protection. Insiders point to Sendo's exit from the market as another sign of the continued consolidation of the global handset market.
For more on Motorola's deal for Sendo:
- see this article from VNUnet.com
PLUS: Why did Sendo fail? Article